Cast, Tap, Disqualified! Worst Play in Pro Tour History

The only time the winner of the Pro Tour was decided with a DQ was in Los Angeles in 1997 where Dave Mills was DQed for tapping his lands AFTER casting his spell and right before he would have won the Pro Tour.

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[Vardaris]

Even more insane thing is that nowadays according to the rules you literally announce the spell first and then tap the mana to pay for it (you can tap the mana first in practice but when you do that you actually just float the mana and use it to pay for the spell after you cast it). Dude was ahead of his time definitely...

[MasterDoctorBenji]

No one would feel good at this result. Even if I won, knowing I lost but was handed the win due to such a technical error, would rot my brain.

[davidmills]

For the record, I did not get warning after warning after warning during the tournament. The FIRST time I heard of this sequence being illegal, along with the warning, was in the actual finals itself. I did get a warning, possibly two, but then I was short on mana and concentrating hard on that, and forgot again. I tended to play far worse when there was an audience. I don't believe that it was even illegal at the time. I'd been playing Magic for years, of course, up until that game, and never once heard of it. Maybe it was a thing in Europe or something. The judge was European. And then of course they expressly made it legal immediately after. I think that sequence (announcing spell before tapping) was only illegal for that one match, in all of Magic history.

Furthermore, I was mana-screwed that game and was in trouble. I had an entire hand of spells I couldn't cast. I decided to do something a little crazy, since Tomi had either 1 or two 3/3's in play (I can't remember which). I cast grave servitude on my 2/2 man of war and attacked. I was wrapped up in the moment, concentrating and distracted by the mana screw and such, and so I said "grave servitude on my man of war!" and that was that. I wasn't making the winning move of the game. Tomi was at 20 life at the time. It is true that, if I drew a land the next turn, I may have won, since Tomi had drawn too MUCH land, and my hand was stacked with good stuff if only I could cast it.

Ironically, my truly stupid play (my only defense being that I sucked whenever there was a large audience), is the game before, I got so happy that I drew a 5th swamp when I had a plague rat and Tomi had a 5/5 creature killing me, that I blew everything up before attacking with the rat for 1... and Tomi was at 1 life when he won that game.

[linkal_]

Fun fact: the judge that DQ’d him got fired for biased disqualifications against certain players so I suppose there was some justice after all…

[petrkovacs]

Several friends play this way and five years back when I played Standard/Modern many players did it the same way. I´m used to "announce cast, tap lands for mana, put card on table to resolve the cast"... everyone was learning this game differently. As long as he tapped those lands/mana sources and he waited for opponent to resolve cast, I would not see a problem (if I was a judge at that time).

[shiningmax]

Judges being just reddit mods this time around

[lorddracon]

either disqualify after the first warning or don't but doing it in the finals is just bad sportsmanship, especially after something so minor

[judgecagle]

I often wonder if the 1999 6th edition rules update changed the proper order to be announcing, then paying mana as a tribute to this incident.

[SuperSilverSerpent]

This is so confusing, isn’t this technically how you’re “supposed to” cast spells? Announce that you intend to cast a spell and then tap mana to pay for said spell? No one actually does it this way and it only matters for KCI combos but still

[loganchristiansen]

My guy just invented affinity for artifacts and lotus petal/treasure ruling

[ImAlexhearmemehYT]

That's such bullshit. If I won first place for that I'd be so fucking pissed because that's not how I would want to win

[chrismanuel]

Imagine being so obsessed with your miniscule power trip that you decide to attempt to steal the winnings from the winning player making the winning move because he didn't say "bazinga" first? Fuck them. He could have said "I win" and thrown the card on the table. Games over.

[wusnade]

man, as long as he admits the mana is already been used it's ok idk why that much strict lol

[literallylyons]

The number of players that don't know you cast the spell first now is astounding

[JustRightPinedo]

Looked this up now bc I just saw a video the Prof posted a few weeks ago with Andrew Mengucci explaining how he was putting Thoughtcast on the stack, reduced by Chromatic star, but the filter-stac’d the star for the blue so he could pay the reduced cost. Old rules that wouldn’t fly

[danielobrien]

"I pay {X} mana (tap mana) to play {X} Card (Put card onto stack) then I read the card, then responses, this is how I have always done it.

[prosamis]

That's just ridiculous
Did judges just have massive egos or something?

You know when it's just an honest error in the end that has 0 bearing or relevance to the game in every scenario and is only illegal because the rules say so, you can... Let it slide

It's like saying you HAVE to have your graveyard behind the library or something and it's otherwise illegal

Like, bro, that has no effect on the game

[superjakeyo]

meh, my worst mistake was when i had a lab mad and a voyager staff with 0 cards in library. none of my opponents had any creature removal and the only thing stopping me was a platinum angel. so on my upkeep i activate voyager staff, exiling platinum angel. one of my other opponents nature claims my voyager staff… In response. Didn’t think much of it but as soon as i get in the car i realize, “voyager staff was not only in the graveyard but the trigger was on the stack. every way u slice it platinum angel was exiled and i won that game.” still salty.

[mrpinguimninja]

It's honestly a really bad call from the judges. Even if they warned him, context should be taken into account when making the ruling. They ended up deciding the tournament by themselves, shouldn't even give the trophy for the other player and just lift the trophy themselves.

[loxeggcheese]

During a double masters 2022 draft I had 2 flyers that added up to lethal damage and a creature enchanted by arachnids web. My opponent had one creature w reach, arachnid spinner. So I cast the spell severed strands; sacrificed the creature w the aura to destroy the spider not thinking anything of it… but alas the spider had more text on it.
Probably the most bizarrely specific way I’ve lost a game of magic